Rice County is a county located in the U. S. state of Kansas. As of the 2010 census, the county population was 10,083; the largest city and county seat is Lyons. The county was named in memory of Samuel Allen Rice, Brigadier-General, United States volunteers, killed April 30, 1864, at Jenkins Ferry, Arkansas. For many millennia, the Great Plains of North America was inhabited by nomadic Native Americans. From the 16th century to 18th century, the Kingdom of France claimed ownership of large parts of North America. In 1762, after the French and Indian War, France secretly ceded New France to Spain, per the Treaty of Fontainebleau. In 1802, Spain returned most of the land to France. In 1803, most of the land for modern day Kansas was acquired by the United States from France as part of the 828,000 square mile Louisiana Purchase for 2.83 cents per acre. In 1854, the Kansas Territory was organized in 1861 Kansas became the 34th U. S. state. In 1867, Rice County was established; the Santa Fe Trail followed the route of present-day U.

S. Route 56. Ruts in the earth from the trail are still visible in several locations. In 1878, Atchison and Santa Fe Railway and parties from Marion County and McPherson County chartered the Marion and McPherson Railway Company. In 1879, a branch line was built from Florence to McPherson, in 1880 it was extended to Lyons, in 1881 it was extended to Ellinwood; the line was leased and operated by the Atchison and Santa Fe Railway. The line from Florence to Marion, was abandoned in 1968. In 1992, the line from Marion to McPherson was sold to Central Kansas Railway. In 1993, after heavy flood damage, the line from Marion to McPherson was abandoned; the original branch line connected Florence, Canada, Lehigh, Galva, McPherson, Windom, Little River, Lyons, Ellinwood. According to the U. S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 728 square miles, of which 726 square miles is land and 1.7 square miles is water. Ellsworth County McPherson County Reno County Stafford County Barton County Quivira National Wildlife Refuge As of the census of 2000, there were 10,761 people, 4,050 households, 2,830 families residing in the county.

The population density was 15 people per square mile. There were 4,609 housing units at an average density of 6 per square mile; the racial makeup of the county was 94.68% White, 1.15% Black or African American, 0.57% Native American, 0.33% Asian, 0.04% Pacific Islander, 1.84% from other races, 1.39% from two or more races. 5.61 % of the population were Latino of any race. There were 4,050 households out of which 31.20% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 59.10% were married couples living together, 7.20% had a female householder with no husband present, 30.10% were non-families. 27.80% of all households were made up of individuals and 15.30% had someone living alone, 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.44 and the average family size was 2.97. In the county, the population was spread out with 24.70% under the age of 18, 13.30% from 18 to 24, 22.80% from 25 to 44, 21.30% from 45 to 64, 18.00% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38 years. For every 100 females there were 92.20 males.

For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 88.20 males. The median income for a household in the county was $35,671, the median income for a family was $40,960. Males had a median income of $31,175 versus $18,968 for females; the per capita income for the county was $16,064. About 8.50% of families and 10.70% of the population were below the poverty line, including 14.60% of those under age 18 and 8.20% of those age 65 or over. Although the Kansas Constitution was amended in 1986 to allow the sale of alcoholic liquor by the individual drink with the approval of voters, Rice County has remained a prohibition, or "dry", county. Sterling USD 376 Chase USD 401 Lyons USD 405 Little River-Windom USD 444District Office In Neighboring CountyCentral Plains USD 112 Sterling College, a private four year Christian institution, is located in Sterling. Pollard Rice County is divided into twenty townships; the cities of Lyons and Sterling are considered governmentally independent and are excluded from the census figures for the townships.

In the following table, the population center is the largest city included in that township's population total, if it is of a significant size. Dry counties National Register of Historic Places listings in Rice County, Kansas Notes CountyStandard Atlas of Rice County, Kansas. A. Ogle & Co. Plat Book of Rice County, Kansas. Handbook of Rick County, Kansas. S. Burch Publishing Co. TrailsThe Story of the Marking of the Santa Fe Trail by the Daughters of the American Revolution in Kansas and the State of Kansas; the National Old Trails Road To Southern California, Part 1. CountyRice County - Official Website Rice County - Directory of Public OfficialsMapsRice County Maps: Current, Historic, KDOT Kansas Highway Maps: Current, Historic, KDOT Kansas Railroad Maps: Current, 1996, 1915, KDOT and Kansas Historical Society

The 23rd Air Army was an Air army of the Soviet Air Forces and the Russian Air Forces, active from the 1960s to the 1990s. It traced its origins to the 12th Air Army, formed during World War II, served in the Transbaikal region for the entirety of its career; the 12th Air Army had been activated by NKO decree of July 1942 on 15 August 1942, from the Air Forces of the Transbaikal Military District. Its initial units included the 30th and 247th Bomber Aviation Divisions, 245th and 246th Fighter Aviation Divisions, the 248th Assault Aviation Division. From 1942 to 1945 it was part of the Transbaikal Front, from 1945 to 1947 part of the Transbaikal-Amur Military District before becoming part of the Transbaikal Military District in 1949. In February 1949 the army was redesignated the 45th Air Army. In July 1957 the army was redesignated the Air Forces of the Transbaikal Military District. In 1962 it was a small force, only comprising an independent reconnaissance aviation regiment and an independent composite aviation squadron.

In late 1967 it was redesignated the 23rd Air Army. Three new aviation divisions were formed in the army between 1967 and 1972. In 1971 the 120th Fighter Aviation Regiment arrived from the Belorussian SSR at Domna and became part of the army as an independent regiment. In 1980 the army was again redesignated the Air Forces of the Tranbaikal Military District. In May 1988 VVS ZabVO was redesignated the 23rd Air Army; the 313th Independent Reconnaissance Aviation Regiment joined 23rd Air Army in December 1993-January 1994, arriving from Georgia to Chindant-2 in the Chita Oblast. In place was the 30th Fighter-Bomber Aviation Division at Step, but the division was disbanded in 1990. Another reconnaissance aviation regiment in the area was the 101st at Borzya-2; the army was disbanded by amalgamation with the 14th Independent Air Defence Army in 1998 to form the 14th Air and Air Defence Forces Army. Http://www.ww2.dk/new/air%20force/army/23va.htm

Trevor Lock is an English comedian and playwright. He is noted for the surreal nature of his comedy. Lock was born in Lincolnshire, he grew up in Bugbrooke, Northamptonshire where he attended Campion School and studied Philosophy at University College London. He has toured the UK supporting both Stewart Lee and Russell Brand and made appearances at the Edinburgh Fringe, he is a founder member and co-host of the comedy cabaret Kool Eddy's in London, which he took to the Edinburgh Fringe festival. In 1999 Lock appeared in Number One Show with Daniel Kitson and Andrew Maxwell at The Gilded Balloon. In 2006 he performed a one-off hour of stand-up Edinburgh Fringe show, When I was a Little Girl – The Very Best of Trevor Lock, at the Gilded Balloon Teviot Wine Bar and appeared in Cloud Cuckooland, a work-in-progress for a forthcoming BBC Radio show with Russell Brand and Matt Morgan, at the Smirnoff'Underbelly', Cowgate. Trevor supported Russell Brand on a number of dates for his stand-up show Shame.

In November 2007 Trevor addressed the Oxford Union on The Meaning of Life in the same week as the British National Party. He disproved Descartes' maxim "Cogito ergo sum" by tipping a glass of water over his head, horrifying the front row of the audience. In 2009, Trevor Lock performed a warm up show for the Edinburgh Fringe Festival at a fundraiser for Boxmoor Cricket Club, he had two shows in the 2009 Edinburgh fringe. In early 2011 Lock revealed plans to tour the UK with a series of gigs held in people's livingrooms called Live in My Living Room. Lock appeared with Russell Brand and Matt Morgan on Brand's Saturday night BBC Radio 2 show, appeared alongside the pair on Brand's Sunday morning show on BBC 6 Music, he was referred to by the nickname'Cocky Locky'. Trevor was teased by his co-hosts for being cruel to animals, having told several stories involving a boot coming through a ceiling and lying or inventing anecdotes; the first of these themes came after a show based on the theme, "What Have I Done To Deserve This?" in which Lock told a story of being caught accidentally drowning a rodent by a vicar.

Brand and Morgan would deride Lock about this and other anecdotes, exaggerating them for comedic purposes. The show featured "Trevor's Sonic Enigma" which Brand and Morgan dubbed "Trevor done a Noise"; this was meant to be a short clip of sound effects and voices which would enable listeners to guess the title of a song. These enigmas were notable for being misleading and confusing as well as long. Winners were invited to join the presenters in the studio the next week. Another regular item was "Challenge Trevor" in which Trevor was set a list of undesirable challenges by the listeners; these went from eating lemons to serenading Noel Gallagher with an Oasis song in Lock's Elvis Presley voice. A running joke was that Brand would shout at Lock: "Eat your fudge!". This catchphrase stemmed from a particular broadcast when Brand presented him with large quantities of the foodstuff; the catchphrase was continued for the duration of the 6 Music show, people went as far to shout out the phrase at his stand-up shows.

When the trio went to Edinburgh in 2006, Lock was arrested for an alleged sexual assault of a 20-year-old student at Brand's flat on 28 August. The case was not pursued, although Lock returned to the 6 Music show in October 2006, Brand noted: "It was the beginning of the end of our relationship because it's hard to recover from that kind of thing." On 10 March 2007, it was announced that he had left the show, by that time on Radio 2, to pursue his own projects his own pilot for BBC 6 Music. On Saturday 12 October 2013 before a performance of Brand's'Messiah Complex' at The Usher Hall in Edinburgh, Brand met Lock at The Raddison Hotel. There, Brand apologised to Lock, saying'You should never have got the blame for all that'. Between 1998 and 1999, Lock appeared in the Lee and Herring BBC Sunday lunchtime show, This Morning With Richard Not Judy, he was mocked weekly by Stewart Lee for having a "small face", but was not allowed to speak as this would mean him having to be paid more. He appeared in two episodes of Time Gentlemen Please, once in the first series in 2000, once in the second series in 2002.

In 2003, he appeared in BBC3's Brain Candy. Lock played a variety of roles in Channel 4's Star Stories including Michael Parkinson, Billy Bob Thornton, Glenn Hoddle, Emilio Estevez and Ant McPartlin. Official Website

Midway House known as Broken M Bar Ranch and Meyer Ranch, is an 1889 Queen Anne ranch house located near Aspen Park, Colorado. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places; the land now known as Meyer Ranch was homesteaded by the Duncan McIntyre family in the mid-19th century. Located near the Turkey Creek wagon road, they lodged travelers; the property was purchased in 1883 by Louis Ramboz, who had the house built in 1889 from lumber milled on the property. Midway House served as an overflow house for a stagecoach stop on the route from Denver to Fairplay, named because of its location midway between Denver and Bailey; the ranch served as the winter quarters for animals of the P. T. Barnum Circus in the late 1880s, but there is no record of P. T. Barnum coming to Colorado. A board inscribed "Circus Town 1889" was found in the house during renovation in 1955. After Ramboz, the ranch was owned by Ralph Kirkpatrick from 1912 to 1950 and run as a working ranch with a hillside cleared for skiing in the early 1940s.

Skiers were transported from the road to the base of a single rope tow in horse-drawn sleighs. The ski area was known as Mount Lugo and, though it closed in 1942, the hills at Meyer Ranch are still enjoyed by cross-country and backcountry skiers. In 1950, Norman and Ethel Meyer bought the ranch including Midway House. In 1959, they bought McIntyre's original homestead; the Meyers sold 400 acres of their 600-acre ranch to Jefferson County Open Space in 1987, which opened Meyer Ranch Park to the public in 1989. The house remains in the Meyers' ownership; as of September 2010, a preliminary agreement has been negotiated to conduct a feasibility study for the establishment of the house as a museum. The location appeared on the pilot episode of the History Channel documentary series Mega Movers, it first aired on April 27, 2005 as a segment of the Modern Marvels episode "Mega Movers", which followed the move of a cabin and an 1870 hay and stock barn closer to the ranch house. National Register of Historic Places listings in Jefferson County, Colorado Meyer Ranch Park page from Jefferson County Open Space Mount Lugo/Meyer Ranch ski area description at Colorado Ski History

The Seattle Fighter Wing was a unit of the United States Air Force, active during the Pacific War of 1942-45. Based in the Northwest, its original purpose was defense against possible Japanese air attack; the Wing has a unique history dating back to the establishment of the Seattle Air Defense Wing in the summer of 1942. The wing was established as an air defense organization to provide protection for the Boeing plants and the multitude of military facilities in the northwest, it was established in mid-1942 after the Second Air Force shifted its mission from air defense of the US northwest to a training organization for heavy bomber crews and groups. The Wing consisted of fighter groups assigned to McChord Field and other fighter airfields in the northwest engaged in training provided by the Fourth Air Force and for third stage training in the Washington-Oregon region which were attached to the wing, would, if necessary, provide a defensive unit in case of a Japanese attack. By mid-1943 the fortunes of war had eliminated the threat of an air raid by the Japanese on the West Coast.

It was designated as a Defense Region, remaining an administrative organization until the end of the war. The organization was placed in a provisional status in January 1945, being re-designated as the Seattle Provisional Control Group, it controlled little or no assets. Its mission remained the air defense of the Pacific Northwest and in July 1946, it moved from Fourth Air Force Headquarters in San Francisco, California to a location in the Seattle area, it was assigned to the new Air Defense Command upon its activation on 21 March 1946. It coordinated air defense in the Northwest, being re-designated the 412th Western Aircraft Control and Warning Group on 1 March 1947. Constituted as the Seattle Air Defense Wing on 6 August 1942Activated on 11 August 1942 Redesignated the Seattle Fighter Wing in July 1943 Redesignated the Seattle Air Defense Region on 1 Jul 1944 Redesignated the Seattle Provisional Control Group on 1 January 1945 Redesignated the Seattle Control Group on 1 January 1947 Redesignated the 412th Western Aircraft Control and Warning Group on 1 March 1947 IV Fighter Command, 11 August 1942 Fourth Air Force, 7 June 1944 Air Defense Command, 21 March 1946 55th Fighter Group: 22 June 1942 – 23 August 1943Attached at McChord Field, Washington372d Fighter Group: 7 December 1943 – 29 March 1944Attached at Portland Army Air Base, Oregon478th Fighter Group: 3 February-31 March 1944Attached at Redmond Army Airfield, Oregon Seattle Airport, Washington, 20 August 1942 San Francisco, California, 7 June 1944 Seattle, Washington, 1 July 1946 This article incorporates public domain material from the Air Force Historical Research Agency website http://www.afhra.af.mil/.

Cornett, Lloyd H. A Handbook of Aerospace Defense Organization, 1946 - 1980. Peterson AFB, CO: Office of History, Aerospace Defense Center. Maurer, Maurer, ed.. Air Force Combat Units of World War II. Washington, DC: Office of Air Force History. ISBN 0-912799-02-1. LCCN 61060979. 505th Command and Control Wing Website

Crassula subaphylla is a succulent plant, widespread in the Karoo regions of South Africa and Namibia. A small, shrubby species; the leaves are distinctively pointed/conical, break off. They are slightly velvety, succulent, 8-15 mm long, light grey-green to yellow-green, are sparsely spread along the stems, its thin, twiggy stems are brittle and hard velvety, with flaking strips of bark. The flowers have distinctively recurved membranous wings on both sides of the petal tips; the typical form, with small lanceolate leaves, occurs in the Little Karoo, the Great Karoo as far as Namibia, in surrounding karooid and mountainous areas, as well as the Overberg in the southern Cape. The rare variety virgata is only found in the far western Namaqualand, has smooth leaves on erect branches; the form that occurs around Worcester, in the south-west decumbent, sometimes has thin, glabrous leaves and only the young stems are hairy. The closest relatives of this species are Crassula mollis, Crassula atropurpurea, Crassula cultrata and Crassula pubescens.

All of these species are caulescent perennials in the Crassula section Globulea, with woody branches, visible internodes, leaves that do not persist long on the stems. It can sometimes be confused with the sympatric species Crassula tetragona or Crassula brevifolia